The Astros announced their season-opening rotation on Monday afternoon. Hunter Brown, Mike Burrows, Cristian Javier and Tatsuya Imai will take the ball in that order for their four-game opener against the Angels. The Halos will counter with José Soriano and Yusei Kikuchi for the first two contests but haven’t announced anything beyond that.
Lance McCullers Jr. has claimed Houston’s fifth starter spot. He’ll go against Ranger Suárez in the first game of next week’s three-game set against the Red Sox. That leaves Spencer Arrighetti and Ryan Weiss outside the rotation picture to begin the year. Weiss seems likely to wind up in the bullpen, while Arrighetti will begin the season in the minors. The Astros optioned him to Triple-A Sugar Land this evening.
It’s Arrighetti’s first minor league stint (not including injury rehabs) since April 2024. The righty held a rotation spot for the majority of the ’24 season. He tossed 145 innings of 4.53 ERA ball spanning 29 appearances. Arrighetti spent the bulk of last year on the injured list. An errant fly ball during batting practice struck his hand and broke his thumb, sidelining him between April and August. Arrighetti went back down in September with elbow inflammation. He was limited to seven starts and allowed a 5.35 ERA across 35 1/3 frames.
There’s a good chance Arrighetti is back up before long. Manager Joe Espada said over the weekend that the Astros are likely to use a six-man rotation once mid-April comes around (via Matt Kawahara of The Houston Chronicle). The team has a stretch of 13 consecutive game days between April 10-22. Imai is also accustomed to pitching once a week, the schedule for starting pitchers in Japan.
Arrighetti is eligible to be recalled right as that part of the schedule begins. Espada indicated he’ll be under consideration for the sixth starter job once the Astros need to make that decision (link courtesy of Chandler Rome of The Athletic). Weiss, Kai-Wei Teng and AJ Blubaugh are other possibilities, though they might all be better suited for multi-inning relief work.
The bigger question is whether McCullers will solidify his hold on a starting spot. The veteran righty pitched his way out of the rotation by the end of last season, finishing the year with a 6.51 ERA across 55 1/3 innings. He managed a league average 22.3% strikeout rate but walked more than 14% of opponents while allowing too many home runs. McCullers has issued four walks and hit a batter while recording five strikeouts over eight innings this spring. He has allowed three runs on six hits.
Various arm injuries have clearly taken a toll on McCullers’ stuff and command. On the plus side, his velocity has ticked back up a bit this spring. He has averaged around 93 mph on his four-seam fastball and sinker after sitting in the 91-92 range a year ago.
